Today in History

Today is Saturday, April 29, the 119th day of 2017. There are 246 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

On April 29, 1992, a jury in Simi Valley, California, acquitted four Los Angeles police officers of almost all state charges in the videotaped beating of motorist Rodney King; the verdicts were followed by several days of rioting in Los Angeles resulting in 55 deaths.

On this date:

In 1429, Joan of Arc entered the besieged city of Orleans to lead a French victory over the English.

In 1798, Joseph Haydn's oratorio "The Creation" was rehearsed in Vienna, Austria, before an invited audience.

In 1817, representatives of the United States and Britain concluded the Rush-Bagot Agreement, which limited the number of naval vessels allowed in the Great Lakes.

In 1861, the Maryland House of Delegates voted 53-13 against seceding from the Union. In Montgomery, Alabama, President Jefferson Davis asked the Confederate Congress for the authority to wage war.

In 1916, the Easter Rising in Dublin collapsed as Irish nationalists surrendered to British authorities.

In 1945, during World War II, American soldiers liberated the Dachau (DAH'-khow) concentration camp. Adolf Hitler married Eva Braun inside his "Fuhrerbunker" and designated Adm. Karl Doenitz (DUHR'-nihtz) president.

In 1957, the SM-1, the first military nuclear power plant, was dedicated at Fort Belvoir, Virginia.

In 1967, Aretha Franklin's cover of Otis Redding's "Respect" was released as a single by Atlantic Records.

In 1977, Pope Paul VI and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Donald Coggan, participated in a Christian unity service in the Vatican's Sistine Chapel.

In 1987, Ronnie DeSillers, a 7-year-old liver recipient whose story had prompted thousands of Americans, including President Ronald Reagan, to lend support, died at a Pittsburgh hospital while awaiting a fourth transplant.

In 1997, Staff Sgt. Delmar Simpson, a drill instructor at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, was convicted of raping six female trainees (he was sentenced to 25 years in prison and dishonorably discharged). A worldwide treaty to ban chemical weapons went into effect. Astronaut Jerry Linenger and cosmonaut Vasily Tsibliyev (sihb-BLEE'-yehv) went on the first U.S.-Russian space walk. Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper columnist Mike Royko died in Chicago at age 64.

In 2011, Britain's Prince William and Kate Middleton were married in an opulent ceremony at London's Westminster Abbey.

Ten years ago: A man shot and killed two people when he opened fire in the parking lot of the Ward Parkway Center in Kansas City, Missouri; the gunman was killed by a police officer inside the mall. (Police believed the gunman had also beaten to death his neighbor, Patricia Ann Reed.) An elevated section of highway that carried motorists from the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge to a number of freeways was destroyed after heat from an overturned gasoline truck caused part of one overpass to crumple onto another. St. Louis Cardinals relief pitcher Josh Hancock, 29, was killed in the crash of his sport utility vehicle.

Five years ago: Despite past differences, President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton began a summer fundraising blitz with an event in McLean, Virginia. An out-of-control SUV plunged more than 50 feet off the side of a New York City highway overpass and landed on the grounds of the Bronx Zoo, killing all seven people aboard, including three children.

One year ago: Hundreds of rowdy protesters broke through barricades and threw eggs at police outside a hotel in Burlingame, California, where Donald Trump addressed the state's Republican convention. Sharing a Vatican stage with Pope Francis, Vice President Joe Biden urged increased funding for cancer research during a conference on regenerative medicine. North Korea sentenced Kim Dong Chul, a U.S. citizen of Korean heritage, to 10 years in prison after convicting him of espionage and subversion. Joey Meek, a friend of Dylann Roof, the white man later convicted of killing nine black parishioners during a Bible study at a Charleston, South Carolina, churchm, pleaded guilty to lying to federal authorities. (Meek was sentenced in March 2017 to more than two years in prison.)

Thought for Today: "Show me somebody who is always smiling, always cheerful, always optimistic, and I will show you somebody who hasn't the faintest idea what the heck is really going on." — Mike Royko (1932-1997).